Lully and the French Overture

In the 1670s Lully fixed a slow-then-fast overture as the sound of French opera.

Related

BaroqueOverture

An overture once existed to seat the audience and prepare the stage. Lully made it the most memorable part of French opera.

Time and place

Paris and Chambord, 1670. Lully worked with Moliere on Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, putting drama, dance and instruments on one stage. In 1672 he obtained the privilege of the Academie royale de musique, and for the next fifteen years French opera was largely his.

What happened

Lully was born in Florence, came to France as a boy and was naturalised in 1661. He wrote court ballets, then comedy-ballets with Moliere, and after 1672 turned to tragedie lyrique. His opera openings settled into two sections. The first is slow, dotted and vertical, like a procession; the second is a fugal allegro whose subject usually enters in the bass before the other voices follow. Later writers called the pattern the French overture. Armide of 1686 brings the design to its fullest, with chorus and stage machinery following immediately.

What changed

The overture became a form that could travel on its own. Dotted rhythm turned into an audible label of French style against Italian fluency, and both Bach and Handel wrote French overtures; court bands used the pattern to judge what counted as French taste. Lully also fixed the production unit of opera, with an academy, a professional orchestra, salaried singers and stage machines working together. His rehearsal discipline was famous, and that discipline is what allowed the slow dotted section to be played really together rather than approximately.

Listen for the turn

Begin with the overture to Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, where the dotted figures stretch each note and release it sharply. Then the overture to Armide, where the bass enters first after the slow section and the other parts follow. Finally the Chaconne des Scaramouches, where the same band changes step and the ceremonial opening becomes dance rhythm. Together they show the two faces of the French overture, ritual and body.

Related

This turn belongs to Baroque and connects 吕利, Overture and 威尼斯公共歌剧院.

Sources

• Grove Music Online, entry "Lully, Jean-Baptiste" — biography and works checked, not quoted
• The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd ed., entry "Overture" — form and diffusion checked, not quoted

Used for fact-checking only; all prose is original.